Hacker

It's called an "Experimental Type Rating", or ETR.

This is the bottom line...PIC only if you signed for it.

I was also up in the vicinity of Tikrit that night, several hours earlier. Rainman Johnson is right...it sucked. I was flying with an ADI up the entire time I was in that area because the vis was terrible.

It wasn't "briefed" as anything...it was officially called a "combat loss" by the investigating board with no further information added about what happened. Many pilots who were there, myself included, think that the cause of the crash was spatial-d, but that's pure speculation based on a lot of circumstantial evidence. The fact of the matter is that it just as easily could have been AAA or the like that caused them to crash because we don't have anywhere near all the information needed to really make a determination. There was a similar crash in Desert Storm where a group of F-15Es was threat reacting while low altitude and everyone similarly thinks that they reacted themselves into the dirt. [ 06. July 2006, 04:55: Message edited by: Hacker ]

First off, DO NOT GIVE UP! Next, separate in your mind for a little while that flying and fun are even similar activities. Part of what you're learning there at UPT is how to deal with this stress mixed in with aviation. It is designed to teach you how to compartamentalize your studies. How to concentrate on the closest, hottest target. How to look at 500 pages of study material and figure out what parts to read and which parts are chaff. As has been said, GO TO A BUDDY and get some assistance with studying. "Stump the dummy" is about the best learning tool I can think of...sit around with a brew and have a buddy open the MQF or the -1 or 11-217 or whatever you're studying and ask questions. So what if you get none right the first time through...eventually you'll get it, and he'll get sharper by asking the questions, too. Have him help you chair-fly your next sortie in the syllabus. If you're further ahead in the syllabus than him, help him chair fly a sortie -- you'll sharpen your skills by having to teach it to someone else. Back to my original point...DON'T GIVE UP!!! UPT is a marathon and not a sprint. Keep the end goal -- wings -- in mind at all times, and be patient.

Okay, so I gotta ask...where's the URL to this one?

I work with the same guy that 10MAN does and have flown with him for the last 3 years. I think he catches more grief from the students about being on TV than from any of his fellow IPs. His video always makes for good fodder in student graduation videos. The difference with the AFP thing, though, is that those guys HAD NO CHOICE in the matter. They didn't get to decide if they wanted to participate in the show or not. Everyone with a website HAS a choice.

You know, I have to say that it was a different world 9-10 years ago when I started my website. When I was initially selected to go to UPT (from active duty), I was hungry for any information about the program that I could get my hands on. At the time, unfortunately, there was NOTHING out there. I couldn't find a book or a website anywhere that had any kind of detailed information about UPT. Again, this is long before there was such a thing as 'blogging', and 56K dialup internet was the heat. So, I decided that since the info wasn't anywhere to be found that I would create that resource, believing that if I were seeking that kind of information on UPT surely there were other guys out there that wanted to know the same thing. About that time I found Dave Werner's "Journal of a Student Naval Aviator" website. As far as I can tell, his website was really the first to have a military pilot training journal on the internet. I liked his site, so I blatantly ripped off the idea and started up one to chronicle the USAF side of training. I have had literally hundreds of guys tell me they read my journal, followed the progress, and learned a lot. The nay-sayers can talk until they are blue in the face that no UPT students benefit from reading some dude's journal, but I believe otherwise because I had MANY, MANY people tell me otherwise. So...that's why I did it. It wasn't for some narcissistic pleasure -- just to be a resource for a niche that didn't have one. Personally, I don't get the blog thing. That doesn't appeal to me in any way, either writing them or reading them. There are enough guys in my line of work who pontificate on every point as if they alone were able to solve the world's problems, so I don't need to read that kind of diatribe on the internet, too. Again, in retrospect if I had it all to do over, I would NOT keep a UPT journal on the internet. Although there are some altruistic benefits as well as some purely personal benefits, NONE of those benefits outweighs the risks of doing it. UPT studs, I'm speaking based on experience here. You don't see the big picture from where you're sitting, but several assignments down the road you may think differently. I keep hearing folks say, "well such-and-such says he's never run into any problems because of his journal." Well, for one I think that's bullsh*t. Lance Ferguson may not have had any repercussions from his blog, but you can bet your ass that his IPs were reading it and joking about it behind closed doors. I know...I was one of his IPs. BESIDES, so what if one or two or three guys have had no problems. I'm here as an example of someone who DID have a problem because of it. Why, why, why would anyone ever risk going through what I did for something with no tangible benefit like keeping an online journal? Even if there was only a one-in-100 chance of having a problem, you're still not very smart for risking it. Use some of that good ORM common sense they've been teaching you in UPT and check out the risks vs the rewards. There are lots of risks and only few rewards. As an aside, I absolutely WOULD keep a personal journal of "there I was" stories while going through training. Recently I converted my logbook over to a digital spreadsheet, and I was able to take some of that stuff and cut-and-paste it into the remarks section for the flights. It made for some great memories of some of the cool sh*t I've done for Uncle Sam. [ 25. June 2006, 19:50: Message edited by: Hacker ]

Yep, that was me. It took me a while, but I finally got some SA after becoming a full-up wingman that I needed to shut the f*ck up. Well, at the time he wrote that, he was some hair-on-fire line fighter pilot in a squadron somewhere. He had no idea he was going to be a SQ/CC, much less MY SQ/CC, 5 years from then. He was doing it because that is what passes for "mentorship" sometimes in a fighter squadron, especially when working with someone who has no f*cking clue what he's talking about (e.g., me at the time). I'm not saying I agree with the tactic, but I can see where it came from. Why did he request me to work for him? Well, because before I worked for him I was a Student Flight/CC and he got to see my act as an instructor pilot. He liked what I had to offer, and by-name hired me. It was after he all ready worked/flew with me that he made the connection that I was the F*ck-O who had the UPT journal way back when. I don't think the two facts had anything to do with each other. That CC we're talking about, by the way, is a kick-ass fighter pilot and a good boss. I'd fly into the sh*t on his wing any day. Nothing ever became of the investigations, save for the enormous asspain of going through them (which was MORE than enough, trust me). Again, when filling out security clearance information, I am now required to answer "yes" when they ask if I've ever been investigated...and spend the next who-knows-how-long explaining what happened. That SQ/CC is probably one of the sh1t-hot Commanders I've ever worked for. See above. You're right...I have no desire to go to the Stinkbug, but that isn't what I meant. I was using that as an example. In the early 80s when the F-117 program was still black and recruiting pilots, they hand-picked nearly everyone. Since nobody knew about the program, they either picked you because you were billy bad-ass, or someone who was in the program knew you and recommended you. I'm sure there are programs like that out there currently (who knows what they're called or what they do), and being Mr Blog or Mr Journal Website isn't going to make you a very attractive candidate for cool programs like that. About the last thing those programs need is someone who has an active life talking about sh1t he does on the internet. Talk about a security slip waiting to happen... If I knew then what I know now...I'd still write all that stuff down in a journal, I just would not post it to the WWW.

That's exactly where you're wrong, on both accounts -- it's ABSOLUTELY NOT harmless and there's no good reason to have it on the WWW for the entire world to see. It's a bad idea no matter how you rationalize it. Here's a repost of my "standard reply" about my experience with an SUPT journal: [ 25. June 2006, 07:51: Message edited by: Hacker ]

This weekend in preparation for an upcoming PCS I was cleaning out an old hard-drive so I can get rid of the old computer its in. I ran across some very funny posts I saved from over at the old studentpilot.net (circa 2001) of a dude who was flaming me for the UPT journal I used to host at www.militarypilot.net Thought you guys might like to read 'em and get a laugh from them, too. Pretty cool, eh? Apparently I'm the laughing stock of the Strike Eagle community as well as just being a "pilot who flies fighters". Smokin'. Here's more: Coool....so I'm apparently a SNAP, too. Read on: Right again, dude. Ready for the punchline? The guy who wrote these messages ENDED UP BEING ONE OF MY SQUADRON COMMANDERS while I've been on this tour in AETC!! Even more hilarious is that he by-name requested me to be in his squadron even knowing that I was this dude. He sprung this knowledge on me while I was standing on stage right before administering the oath for promotion, in front of all my bros.

That's just a gut check that you'll gain with experience. Although you might like th think so, but you do not have the complete picture while sitting there at UPT. You have seen some aspect of the AF up until now, but you have not seen that place where you're going to spend the next 10 years as an officer. Most importantly, you'll be able to see what the social norms of an operational flying unit are and make your decision against that backdrop. I think you'll find that it will be very clear to you where "the line" is eventually...but the line you're towing currently isn't going to work in the real world.

I don't think that there are any fighter squadrons that are located high enough for you to fit in with your Ivory Tower. You may want to look into a career that does not involve killing people and breaking things for a living with airplanes. Or, perhaps, you might just want to take your Lieutenant Smalley (remember the guy who sent out the email about not drinking as an AF officer??) look at this topic and reserve judgment for when you actually have wings and are in an operational squadron.

The part you missed is that the whole thing unraveled when one of the students who was deliberately not given the test gouge (as in, not a bro) ratted out the rest of the students. The guy graduated UPT and IFF, and was on his way to his fighter FTU (probably long since finished by now). Sure hope the bro network doesn't let that one fall through the cracks.

My understanding is that he wasn't actually having sex with the student...just acting like a 13 year old with a crush.

How about: F. Go drink margaritas

Sorry, not Hoser, but I've seen plenty of FAIPs come through Blue jets. I know of plenty examples of FAIPs that have gone through the pipeline in the last 5 years that have done well. The point of this thread is not that FAIPs are doomed to mediocrity, but that FAIPs aren't really any different than any other pipeline produced pilot. They're just on a slightly different timeline for the first 10 years of their flying career. IMHO, part of the problem that Hoser mentioned about guys going to crappy assignments after their first ops tour has nothing to do with them being FAIPs. That's indicative of the really strange state of the fighter force currently. Reference the earlier discussions about fighter guys being unable to get TX courses from non-operational tours. It's because of BRAC, and USAF downsizing, and the rise in prominence of the UAV sect, and a half dozen other factors that are tearing apart the "traditional" fighter career of the last 10 years.

I don't understand why some people have this weird itch to be FAIPs. I still can't fathom why someone would desire to become a USAF pilot, yet want to put off getting qualified in an MWS and going to do the real J-O-B. There are a couple decent things about being a FAIP -- the problem is that none of them are any better than the benefit of just going to a real MWS and being a MR pilot. Family life? Yup, it's nice to be at a non-deploying 730-1630 job in the CONUS. Someone all ready said it earlier -- remember that there's a career beyond your first assignment, and you may very well want that cushy AETC job in 3-4 years when your kids are older. Your back-to-back ops assignments, or worse, your ops-to-remote-to-staff, or any other combination that leaves an AETC tour out of the picture may not be as good as it sounds now. A bunch of flight hours early in your career? Whoop de doo. FAIPs that come through IFF and FTU are exactly the same as any other student. They don't get treated any differently and, for the most part, they don't perform any differently either. I think they upgraded to flight lead just as fast as anyone else did in my ops unit (translation: nobody in a fighter unit gives a crap about the 1 hour you had in a T-6 1,000 times over with a student). I hear that in the heavies you'll get a faster upgrade to AC, though -- and you'll still be years behind the guys who were in your UPT class. I was in a non-rated job for the first 3-4 years I was in the AF. Although I learned a lot there and I feel it not only helped me in UPT but also my development as an officer, I would never recommend that someone that wants to become a pilot go do a tour as a non-rated guy first. I feel the same way about FAIPing. If it happens to you, then fine...make the best of it and you may be able to turn that flight/instructional experience into some benefits later in your MR career. But why would you voluntarily stiff-arm getting to the meat of the reason you wanted to become a military pilot??

Here ya go! http://www.dynamictruth.com/ubb/ultimatebb...329.html#000000

Does anyone have SA on a similar rotator flight to Lakenheath or Mildenhall off the right coast?

Okay, I'll bite. There have been five. I still stand by my original assertion that non-fighter guys in the U-2 are NOT being sent to "line" fighter jobs AT ALL (the stinkbug is a special duty assignment and doesn't count - I'm talking about Vipers, Eagles, and Hogs). I suspect with these other guys, like "Stone", we're still talking about specific dudes who had high-level leaders specifically directing the "system" to get them to the stinkbug. Your guys from the 90s who went to the Viper do not count. Pre 1999 there was specifically a mechanism for heavy dudes to go transfer over to fighters (crossflow board). MORE importantly, the guys you're talking about from the mid-90s probably did UPT in the all-T-38 syllabus, so according to the leadership, they're still qualified to go over to a fighter. The issue since then has been essentially that anyone T-1 trained will not go to an active AF fighter billet. ANG units have a LOT more leeway, and they can send virtually anyone they want through the system, provided they go to the T-38 qual course at RND before IFF and FTU. You're still talking about 5 pilots in more than 6 years that have come out of the U-2 and gone to one specific, non-line fighter airframe (where, by the way, they're undermanned and non-vol'ing line fighter guys to). Not great odds for a T-1 trained bubba who has a burr under his saddle to go fly a pointy-nosed airplane. Better odds are to go find a fighter ANG unit that's hiring. How's my boy "Ping" doing out in his initial qual at Beale (he's a FAIP from Moody)? Any SA on training of new dudes? [ 01. June 2006, 04:53: Message edited by: Hacker ]

That is all pre-BRAC...with numerous F-16 units closing down, several F-15C units going away (or converting to Raptor), and the ANG absolutely taking it in the pooper. Again, it's the politics of $$. The "new student" FTU pipeline will not be shut off or slowed down, so with the same amount of new guys being produced each year and less cockpits for them to go to...where is the slack going to be made up? Answer: in the TX courses.

I have only seen *one* person do this. One. Uno. This was one guy, a Marine on an exchange, who went to an F-117 from the U-2 by order of a couple Generals. Post 1999 (when the crossflow boards closed) I've never seen a "line" USAF guy from a non-fighter background get sent to a "line" USAF fighter job via the U-2. Non-fighter guys who go to the U-2 have not been through IFF, so they would have to get an IFF slot out of programmed PFT. Plus, they'd have to get an FTU B-Course slot out of programmed PFT. All of that...not very likely to happen. With the number of F-15C and F-16C units closing thanks to BRAC, even previously rated fighter pilots in non-fighter jobs (ALFA, staff, schools)are having a tough time getting back to their fighters. Unless you have a General out there who is shepherding you around, I wouldn't count on it happening.

That was actually for the show "Heavy Metal" on the F-15 -- it was not just about that incident, but the history of the Eagle.

Tradition/superstiton going back to Vietnam (and maybe before, I dunno) that says if you're wearing a moustache during combat you're bulletproof.